Can i ask your tank size and the fish you have im doing the same with two different tanks one is a 55 gal goldfish tank and the other a 40 gal tropical community tank and the pothos are growing like weeds! Im actually considering building some type of hydroponics setup to see how much of the nitrates i can get rid of.

Start a more aggressive water change routine. That's the best way to reduce nitrates. Land plants will work, but the plant must have a large root ball with all the potting mixture removed. It also needs a constant source of oxygen to the roots. Pothos doesn't grow large enough to impact the nitrate levels in the water, it doesn't have a large enough root system.

Having a plant growing out of the filter is a nice conversation piece, but this plant isn't effective for nitrate control. If you want a land plant that's a real nitrate user, research Chinese evergreen.

B

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__________________"Fear not, my young apprentice. Just change the tank water."

This is a fun experiment. I have seen a fish store that kept pothos in the rear of their fish tanks (not just the filter) and had the roots growing down the back of the tank. Looks really cool once there are tons of established stems! I'm interested to see what you find in this fun endeavor!

Thanks everyone it is a 20 long and had 2 bosemani rainbows and a cory catfish. A lot of people told me It wouldn't work but the results say otherwise. The nitrate started at 30-40 ppm and now is 10ppm with no water changes just topping of.

What did you do specifically? Did you just rest the plants in the filter? Or did you put something in for the roots to hold onto? Were the roots already established or did you use clippings? Sorry for all the questions. I'm sort of experimenting with the same thing.

I went to lowes and got a small bag of river rock and a small pot of pothos. I took the cartridge out of the filter replaced it with the river rock and planted the pothos plants in the rock after rinsing the dirt of the roots. So,yes the plants already had roots.